Video: “The Avengers” Super Bowl trailer

posted at 6:15 pm on February 6, 2012 by Allahpundit

To cleanse the palate, in case you’re one of the six or seven people in America who didn’t see it last night. Three obvious questions here. One: How can it be that this trailer is actually weaker than the one that came out in October? They had three extra months of post-production and editing to deliver their very best stuff for the Super Bowl spot. Two: Is there really no Marvel woman superhero cooler than Black Widow? Jonathan Last is tragically correct about that sad-trombone dramatic pan near the end. Three: I haven’t seen “Captain America” or “Thor” so correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Downey’s “Iron Man” character dramatically more snarky and colorful than the rest of the characters here? My understanding is that the rest are all straightforward superheroes — serious, earnest, alpha, vanilla, — whereas Tony Stark is quite Downey-ish, i.e. quick-witted and a touch nebbishy. That’s a strange mix of personality types, sort of like sticking Bill Murray in the middle of a war movie. (A real war movie, not “Stripes.”) Am I right about that or does Captain America also have a wicked deadpan sense of humor that he uses to disarm Nazis before killing them?

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O/t: has anyone else see the first six min of the Dark Knight Rises? I saw it before viewing Mission Impossible in IMAX and it was unreal. If the opening sequence is indicative of what the rest of the film is going to be like, it should easily spank anything else coming out this year with the possible exception of Prometheus.

Hmmm, I still have my Thor , Iron Man, Captain America comic books from the 60′s. I can never believe that the movies will do justice(no pun intended, or perhaps so) to them. All I would ever want is to keep the them of the books the same. But, no, the movies will always plug world order, environment and the hate of the US in them. I’ll pass.

I’m not sure where you get nebbishy. I’ve never gotten that vibe off of Tony Stark, but maybe I’m just not paying attention.

Snark? Oh, absolutely. And that’s, I’m sure, almost all Downey. I’m willing to bet that the original screenplay for Iron Man has very little relationship to the final product. RD, Jr., had to have been riffing his way through most of the scenes, and forced rewrites ongoingly.

I’m definitely looking forward to the release of Avengers. If the writing exhibited in the previews carries into the movie itself, it’s going to be great.

I really wish that Samuel L. Jackson wasn’t such an ignorant, intellectually lazy jerk. If he hadn’t accused me of being a racist, I’d be first in line to see this. Alas, I don’t do business with those who insult me. :(

I was disappointed they didn’t show the trailer for that during the Superbowl. IMDB seemed to indicate that one had been cut for it. If the movie is anywhere near as epic as the books, it should make a mint. The casting seems to be spot on.

The problem is the Marvel Movie universe is science based. They even found a more or less scientific way to explain Thor. Most of the cooler Marvel Females are either Mutants that belong to other Studios, i.e. any of the X-Men characters belong to Fox, or their powers are magic based like Scarlet Witch(who was later deemed to be a mutant too).

My understanding is that the rest are all straightforward superheroes — serious, earnest, alpha, vanilla, — whereas Tony Stark is quite Downey-ish, i.e. quick-witted and a touch nebbishy. That’s a strange mix of personality types, sort of like sticking Bill Murray in the middle of a war movie.

No AP that is not the way it worked out in the comics. Mostly because they never had a write who was talented enough to pull the movie character off. The movie Stark is what they always had in mind. That look like an army of either Kree or Skrull maybe?

Most of your problems here are with the degree to which Marvel is sticking to canon. The characters here are selected because they are heavily associated with The Avengers series.

And yes, Iron Man is snarky, while Cap is earnest. However, the trailer clearly indicates that this is part of where the dramatic conflict comes in the movie. There’s going to be a fair amount here about disparate personalities uniting for a common cause.

…and if they play that card heavily enough, you’ll get a “Is The Avengers a CGI version of the Chrysler Super Bowl ad?” post out of it!

O/t: has anyone else see the first six min of the Dark Knight Rises? I saw it before viewing Mission Impossible in IMAX and it was unreal. If the opening sequence is indicative of what the rest of the film is going to be like, it should easily spank anything else coming out this year with the possible exception of Prometheus.

Kataklysmic on February 6, 2012 at 6:25 PM

I saw the the six minute trailer for the Dark Knight Rises and its the best trailer I’ve ever seen. EVER. I think there are better surprises in store than what was shown in the trailer.

By the way…I still don’t get what Promethus is about. I’m told that its a prequel to Aliens. Is that right?

Yeah not sure where they are going with this. I would say it’s a Kree-Skrull war but what is Loki doing there, and I doubt it’s going to be just the Skrull since the super Skrull is Fantastic 4 territory.

Loki was responsible for the formation of the Avengers in the first place as he was tricking the Hulk into smashing stuff. The various heroes showed up to deal with the Hulk and ultimately formed a team.

O/t: has anyone else see the first six min of the Dark Knight Rises? I saw it before viewing Mission Impossible in IMAX and it was unreal. If the opening sequence is indicative of what the rest of the film is going to be like, it should easily spank anything else coming out this year with the possible exception of Prometheus.

Kataklysmic on February 6, 2012 at 6:25 PM

I saw it twice and it was impressive. Like the precredits sequence from Licence To Kill on steroids. But Nolan better do something about Bane’s voice before it’s released to theaters.

As for The Avengers, first of all you need to see Thor and Captain America, Allah. Both are solid flicks and do help set up The Avengers(make sure to watch through the end credits, especially for Thor). Hell, Captain America was even pretty decent in 3D. Secondly regarding the personalities of the respective superheros, Thor was a lot like Stark early on in the movie, but he matures and mellows out by the end. Steve Rogers(aka Cap) is basically Superman with a shield instead of a cape. A patriot and overall good guy who wants to bring bad guys to justice.

I’m really excited about your vision for The Avengers and how it’s really a broken family…or a family…

Broken is okay.

Is there any way you could expand on that just a tiny bit for us?

It just really just goes back to the very first incarnation of The Avengers. It goes to The Ultimates, it goes to everything about it. It makes no sense, it’s ridiculous. There’s a thunder god, there’s a green “ID” giant rage monster, there’s Captain America from the 40s, there’s Tony Stark who definitely doesn’t get along with anybody. Ultimately these people don’t belong together and the whole movie is about finding yourself from community. And finding that you not only belong together but you need each other, very much. Obviously this will be expressed through punching but it will be the heart of the film.

Yea, I know. I’m not familiar enough with the comic book history beyond what I said, but according to IMDB Loki is also at least inadvertently responsible for bringing the Kree-Skrull war to Earth in the first place. Presumably they are going to combine the two ideas for the movie.

Capt. America? Eh, I wasn’t expecting to be Shakespeare, but it did enhance the flavor of my pizza with the cheese factor :o)

Hulk: You better be talking about the Ed Norton version…lmao

Iron Man 1 vs 2? 1 was funny as hell; 2 at least had Mickey Rourke & War Machine to look forward to. If nothing else, casting Jackson as Fury I will give them a chance. But come on, you know you wanna see him do a “Snakes on a Plane” riff so bad….

Black Widow was an actual character and lets face it, its supposed to be geared to nerd/nerdetts, so there’s gotta be some T&A shots right?

I will wait for Avengers to come to Redbox/Netflix though, for no other reason, I enjoy the comfort of my home for certain movies.

OTOH, I will be in a IMAX theater watching The Dark Knight Rises…and be loving every frickin minute of it too!

My problem with this assembly of superheroes is that they’re spread out so widely along the spectrum of unrealistic: Iron Man has technology, not super powers. Captain America has both, but his powers (like the Hulk’s) are attributed to science. Then there’s Thor, a Norse god from another planet whose adopted brother is a green ice giant alien–like Green Lantern, that’s all just too far-fetched and too far-removed from our time and place for my taste.

Also, Captain America will seem a strange fit coming from the 40s.

Wow . . . how is it that I have time to comment so thoughtfully on such an unimportant topic?

I was disappointed they didn’t show the trailer for that during the Superbowl. IMDB seemed to indicate that one had been cut for it. If the movie is anywhere near as epic as the books, it should make a mint. The casting seems to be spot on.

Kataklysmic on February 6, 2012 at 6:31 PM

I was bummed too, but apparently it aired during the 16-hour long pre-game show.

Both trailers are online. As a fan of the books, I actually preferred the first trailer.

Re: Avengers, I was also dubious about how they were all going to fit together, but they sciencified Thor up pretty good. I’ll go see it.